Rushdie told German magazine his life is now 'relatively normal'

FILE PHOTO: The writer Salman Rushdie interviewed during Heartland Festival in Kvaerndrup, Denmark June 2, 2018. Carsten Bundgaard/Ritzau Scanpix/via REUTERS/File Photo

FRANKFURT (Reuters) - In an interview conducted just weeks before he was stabbed and seriously wounded by an attacker in New York state, author Salman Rushdie said his life was now "relatively normal", after having lived in hiding for years because of death threats.

Rushdie talked in the interview with Germany's Stern magazine about the threats he sees to U.S. democracy. He also called himself an optimist, and noted that the fatwa, a religious edict issued in Iran in 1989 that called on Muslims around the world to kill him for blasphemy, was pronounced long ago.